Ditch the Dopamine Dependence
Have you noticed when your kids get a bad case of “attitude” after playing video games? Or a sugar rush after too much candy?
Have you ever noticed yourself feeling anxious or jittery after too much soda? Or you can’t seem to stop scrolling through social media, or be done with your job for the day?
Does your spouse seem like he/she can’t get enough of going to the gym?
All of these symptoms have something in common -
Dopamine.
Did you know that our brains naturally produce dopamine as a chemical reward? That’s right! There are four reward chemicals that occur in the body - dopamine, serotonin, oxytocin, and endorphins. Whenever a person does something like play video games, or consume sugar, or exercise, or eat, or get together with friends, or listen to music, or get compliments at work, or engage in sexual activities, these activities release reward chemicals into our bodies.
Dopamine, and its reward chemical friends, are a kind of neurotransmitter. Your body’s nervous system uses them to send messages between your nerve cells.
Dopamine is good for us. Little doses tell our brains that what we are doing will keep us alive and feel happy. The brain wants to seek pleasure, expend as little energy as possible, and protect us from danger. Dopamine is part of the body’s reward system to help us stay alive.
Sometimes, we get too much dopamine. We cannot become addicted to dopamine because it occurs naturally in our bodies. But we can become addicted to external substances that cause a lot of dopamine to be released into the body. When this happens, the lower brain overrides thought processes in the higher brain. Sometimes people lose control of their actions because of the lower brain’s desire for the pleasure chemicals.
If you are ready to ditch your dopamine dependence, or if you know someone else who is, Let’s get started! There is no shame in this process. This is simply a matter of learning how to recognize what your brain wants, and how to tell it to “Chill out.”
Just A Thought
